Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas believes electric vehicles in the market could drop as low as $5,000 in the future. Tesla seems well on its way to releasing more affordable electric cars with its $25,000 car.
Jonas explained that high volume production of EVs would eventually lead to price cuts.
“We would not be at all surprised to see the prices of many EVs eventually fall to below $5k/unit,” Jonas wrote in a note after talking with carmakers, suppliers, and experts in the electric vehicle sector.
Since the sales and release of the Model 3, Tesla has introduced several price cuts in its vehicles made within the United States and China. The Model 3 Performance is a good example of this, as the car debuted with a $78,000 price tag before Autopilot. Today, a Model 3 Performance with basic Autopilot costs $55,990.
Tesla doesn’t seem to want to stop at price cuts for its current lineup, either. The company has also shared its plans to release a $25,000 car in the future. There is already talk of Tesla’s $25,000 electric vehicle being developed in China.
Elon Musk talked about the company’s price goals during the Q3 earnings call last year, revealing Tesla’s objective to make its cars as affordable as possible.
“I do not think we lack for desire for our product, but we do lack for affordability,” said Musk. “And so we have to improve the affordability of our products, so they are not out of reach of people. We want to bring them more in reach over time but also improve our cost of production.”
According to Street Insider, Jonas highlighted the impact manufacturing efficiencies would have in high-volume EV production in his note, which Tesla seems highly aware of based on past comments by Musk and the company’s CFO Zachary Kirkhorn.
Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdry argued that Tesla has a “generational lead in battery technology.” He estimated that Tesla’s battery tech might have reduced the price per kilowatt-hour by 56% and production costs by 69%.
The Model 3 was Tesla’s first high-volume vehicle. The company had a difficult time ramping production with the Model 3. However, Tesla seems to have learned many ways to improve production efficiency since the Model 3 and continues to keep improving with time.
Tesla’s production improvements are evident with its Gigafactory in China. Giga Shanghai’s production efficiency may have resulted in the price cuts of the locally-made Model 3 last year, making it eligible for tax purchase exemptions.
Adam Jonas reiterated Morgan Stanley’s “Overweight” rating and $880 price target on Tesla in his note.
Disclosure: I own shares of TSLA.
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